Mencken - book

I have just finished reading Mencken The American Iconoclast, by Marion Elizabeth Rodgers (Oxford University Press, 2005). This is further subtitled, The Life and Times of the Bad Boy of Baltimore.

If you are an aficionado of biography, as I am, I doubt you will ever find a finer example of the genre. Rodgers has done a superb job with a subject of enormous complexity, H. L. Mencken. It is carefully researched, thoughtfully and clearly written, and manages to present the genius that was Mencken in all of his marvelous contradictions and prejudices. The most basic features of Mencken’s life and work might be most easily summed up by his unflagging and persistent insistence upon free thought, free speech, and a free press. He opposed censorship at all times and hated hypocrisy above all. While he is not much in the forefront of our minds at the moment, his influence on American literature and American language is monumental. His early championship of Theodore Dreiser changed the face of American literature for all time. He also was almost solely responsible for the rise of Afro-American writing in the United States, and his book, In Defense of Women, was influential in the ways we came to perceive the rights and obligations of each other (although some women thought it was condescending). His book, The American Language was definitive and written before the rise of modern linguistics. As a newspaper reporter he was without peer. He had an important role in bringing about the famous Scopes trial and was present and reported on virtually every major event for almost 50 years. As a magazine editor he either discovered or promoted all of the major American writers after Dreiser: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Thomas Wolf, Sinclair Lewis, John Steinbeck, Ernest Hemingway, and more. He was close friends with Joseph Hergesheimer (who was considered one of the greatest American writers at that time although now is virtually unknown) and also James M. Cain, as well as with the publisher Alfred A. Knopf. He was, in short, a giant in the literary world of his time.

Henry Lewis Mencken was born in 1890 and lived for 75 years in Baltimore, most of the time in the same house with his mother. He was a man of enormous contradictions, absolutely detested by many and adored by many more, no doubt partly a result of his striving to tell the truth about things as they were, and his constant exposing of hypocrisy. A student of Darwin, he also admired Huxley, and believed in both social and physical evolution. A student of Nietzsche, he believed that some groups of people were superior to others, and yet he championed civil and equal rights for years. His fights against censorship were legendary but of course resulted in animosity between himself and what he often called the “booboisie.” His opinion of the American public was far less than flattering, as expressed by his often quoted remark, “Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.” Although he believed that some groups were superior to others, in his dealings with people he dealt with them as individuals rather than as stereotypes. He railed at times against the institution of marriage but when he finally married, rather late in life, he was a model husband who worshipped his wife. He was an unrepentant agnostic but insisted he felt no animosity towards those who were religious, although much of his life was spent opposing “do-gooders” and those who attempted to force their beliefs on others. As H. L. Mencken, famous iconoclast, “bad boy,” curmudgeon, master of the poison pen, acerbic critic, and deadly opponent, he was feared by those he felt compelled to attack. As plain old Henry Mencken in his daily life he was friendly and gentle, a loyal friend and benefactor to many, lover of children, and boon companion to many lifelong friends.

Mencken was probably never more in his element than in political conventions in which he delighted. He covered both Republican and Democratic conventions and always had strong feelings about the candidates. Here, too, his tongue was always sharp and sometimes devastating. Consider, for example, his comment on a speech by Warren G. Harding: “The worst English I have ever encountered. It reminds me of a string of wet sponges; it reminds me of tattered washing on the line; it reminds me of stale bean soup, of college yells, of dogs barking idiotically through endless nights.” When asked why the speech was so bad he replied: “When Dr. Harding prepares a speech he does not think it out in terms of an educated reader locked up in jail, but in terms of a great horde of stoneheads gathered around a stand…an audience…of morons scarcely able to understand a word of more than two syllables, and wholly unable to pursue a logical idea for more than two centimeters.” A lifelong foe of socialism and communism, and with a hatred of Franklin D. Roosevelt surpassed by no one, Mencken supported Wendell Wilkie and criticized the New Deal endlessly, although he recognized FDR as an extremely clever politician.

Perhaps the most misunderstood of Mencken’s contradictions had to do with his German heritage. Although born in the United States, he was German to the core. Some of his ancestors had been well-known German academics, a fact of which Mencken was proud, and he viewed Germany and German culture as superior to most others. He visited his homeland on several occasions and thought it a beautiful and wonderful place with hard-working citizens and orderly lives. Thus when the First World War was about to break out he was entirely sympathetic to Germany and not at all pleased with President Wilson. He was in Germany for a while just before the outbreak of hostilities and was aware that most of the information Americans were getting about the situation and Germany was filtered through England and was mostly propaganda. He thought this was decidedly unfair and said so to the point where he was accused of being pro-German at a time when that was not at all acceptable (sauerkraut was renamed “freedom cabbage” at the time, among other things). As a German sympathizer he was subject to a great deal of discrimination as the war proceeded. In fact, it was this experience of discrimination that later led him to champion the rights of blacks and others. More importantly, however, this early experience blinded him to what was occurring prior to and during the Second World War. He could not bring himself to believe that things were as bad as they were in Germany or that the Jews were being treated so terribly. He thought Hitler was merely a simple buffoon that could not last and was essentially harmless. He believed the problems were the result of the terrible and stupid conditions Germany had been subjected to as a result of losing the first war. He resisted reality until Kristallnackt made him realize the truth. He then became outraged that none of the allies would accept Jewish refugees, including FDR, and tried to get the U.S. to accept some of them. Although here, true to form, he thought there were good Jews and bad Jews. The good Jews he thought should be accepted into the U.S., the bad Jews he suggested should go to Russia. Thus the accusations that he was anti-Semitic were true even though he spoke out on their behalf. For the most part, however, he remained pretty silent about the tragedy that was occurring.

Given his cynicism about politics, and his opinion of the American public, he predicted what would eventually happen, a prediction I think that came true in 2000:

“As democracy is perfected, the office of the president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.”

This is a truly fine book about a time and a place and a brilliant but flawed character, who fought the good fight irrespective of the personal consequences, and managed to make of America a better place.